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Second year, Ivar’s third trip to England, going back to raid with his brothers a second time (so Sansa’s first trip back)
The church was filled with the sighs of the dying, Ivar’s warriors finishing off anyone who was still alive and searching them for any valuable goods. These people had little, though, and gave it all to their priests, to judge from the gold and bejeweled objects currently being looted from the church, and the fine fabrics of the priests’ clothes. Unfortunately there was no point in taking those, once Ivar was done with the people wearing them.
The death gurgle faded away and Ivar gazed greedily around, looking for any other Saxon whose misery he could prolong. These church people just gave up and died too easily. Then he heard another sound that interested him.
“Quiet!” Ivar snapped, and everyone froze. “Do you hear that?” he asked, but no one knew what he was talking about. There was a lot to hear. He started to crawl across the stone floor, turning sticky as the blood dried, signaling for bodies to be moved out of his way. He paused to listen again and changed direction slightly. Everyone else continued to pause and watch him carefully for cues—you did not survive long in Ivar’s band by ignoring his commands.
“Ah,” he realized when he discovered what he was looking for—the body of a Saxon woman. “Move her arm.” This revealed the source of the sound he had heard—an infant she had been holding, now no longer muffled by her cloak as it cried in distress. Ivar shoved her body aside so he could crawl right up to the baby. “Hello, little one,” he said in a kind tone. His gloves were dripping blood, so he prudently removed one before stroking the baby’s cheeks. “There you go,” he encouraged as the child, seeking comfort, started to calm.
Ivar scooped the baby up and rolled over to sit up, soothing the child while also inspecting it for damage; it appeared to be fine, and a boy. “Yes, this will be good,” he decided with some delight, the delight of a new idea that was guaranteed to be brilliant. There was only one problem, though, something he had not yet figured out with his own daughter back home—how to move while carrying a baby safely. He did not trust his stability on crutches that much and he needed his hands to crawl.
Well, that was what one had underlings for. “Carry this for me,” he ordered the man next to him, but then to Ivar’s horror, the man began to reach down with one hand, his sword still in the other. “What are you doing?” Ivar berated him, pulling the baby close. “You cannot carry a baby like that, you will hurt it. You,” he demanded of the next-closest person. “Do you know how to carry it properly?”
The man put his sword away and reached down with both hands. “Yes, my prince, I have three at home.”
Ivar studied his technique critically and was satisfied. “Good. We will take it to my wife now,” he announced, starting to crawl towards the door. “It will be a good gift.”
**
“But why do you have it?” Hvitserk kept asking, utterly bemused as Ivar dandled the baby on his lap at the table in the main keep.
“It is for Sansa,” Ivar told him, once again. “She likes babies. And here is one she did not have to labor for.” Hvitserk opened his mouth again but Ivar cut him off. “I will tell you what to do,” he announced. “You should get a baby. Women like babies. They are everywhere around here, you can find them easily. Then you take it back to Kattegat and walk around, and all the women will come up to you. ‘Oh, is that a baby? Do you need help with it?’” Hvitserk thought it was probably safe to chuckle at Ivar’s impression of a woman, which was somehow just regular Ivar. “In this way, you can get a woman. Or several. And perhaps your wives would like some new babies as well,” he suggested helpfully to Ubbe and Bjorn.
“We’ll just go around England stealing babies!” Hvitserk suggested, slightly tipsy. “Ivar the… Baby Thief!”
“That sounds terrifying,” Ivar claimed. “I would be terrified of that. Why does he steal babies? What does he do with them? Does he eat them? Probably.” He chomped his teeth playfully at the baby, who giggled as Ivar held him up.
Sansa came over with a bowl and sat down beside Ivar, kissing him on the cheek. “Do you want to feed the baby?” she asked him. “He should be able to eat soft foods,” she added, indicating the bowl and spoon. “But very, very soft and smooth, because he doesn’t have teeth and can’t chew anything.” She started to affix a cloth over the baby, confident Ivar would be up to the task.
“Oh, I did not realize he was that old,” Ivar admitted with disappointment. “Do you want a newer one?”
“No, I like this one,” Sansa assured him, tickling the baby. Ivar picked up the spoon with some broth on it and began attempting to get it inside the baby’s mouth, a more complex process than he would have predicted. “Do you know what you want to name him?” she asked. “Do you want to use your father’s name?”
“No,” Ivar decided after a moment of thought. “We will save that for our real son. You may name him.”
“Shall we name him after you?” she suggested next.
“Hmm, Ivar… the One with Bones,” Ivar tried out critically. Hvitserk laughed, which Ivar ignored. “No, I think it will confuse people.”
Luckily Sansa had come prepared with more ideas. “What about Edgar?”
“Edgar,” Ivar repeated, trying it out and assessing whether it fit the child. “Edgar Ivarsson. Edgar the Butcher.” The baby drooled with a dubious expression, as Sansa tsked her husband’s choice of epithet. “Yes, I think Edgar is a good name.”
Hvitserk had been thinking something over deeply, though. “But how do I get the baby back to Kattegat?” he wanted to know. “So all these women will flock to me. Not that I have trouble with that,” he added quickly.
Ivar rolled his eyes. “Do I have to do all the thinking for you, Hvitserk?” he demanded irritably. "It is small. You put it in a box.” Bjorn coughed a little in his ale.
“A box?” Hvitserk repeated in confusion.
“Like a chicken.” Ubbe put his head down on the table and quietly died. “They sleep in boxes,” Ivar added defensively.
“Babies or chickens?” Bjorn managed to ask.
“Both,” Ivar realized.
“I am either too drunk, or not drunk enough, for this conversation,” Hvitserk concluded. Then he kept drinking.
“Do you know nothing about babies?” Ivar accused. “Do you know where they come from?” he added mockingly.
“Apparently they are just lying around all over the place,” Hvitserk shot back.
“Good point,” Ivar conceded.
“Let’s go back to planning our next raid,” Bjorn suggested, a far safer and saner topic.